No Subject

From: jtravis@DELETETHIScwcom.net

Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 10:11:36 GMT

Mark Parkinson wrote:
Hi Jason
I am not on any committee and have no connection with Iraq. I have
been deeply concerned about the genocide in Iraq since the start. I
am also concerned about 'Imperialist' issues but I now never use
the term.
> At the last National Co-ordination Meeting of anti-sanctions groups
That's the key for me - it does not say 'and anti-war'.
More pragmatically, the more people and organisations that are
involved and the narrower the focus (criminal, humanitarian,
genocide, sanctions) the better chance we have of making
progress against sanctions (and such progress would help
undermine the imperialists).
In terms of civilian casualties sanctions far outweigh the illegal
bombings.
I would dearly love to get HRW and Amnesty actively fighting these
sanctions. Any sniff of anti-war or anti-imperialism and they would
disapppear.
It is quite possible to get middle of the road, establishment and
even right wingers to fight against sanctions. They need to be told
about the effects of sanctions and have the US/UK arguments
answered which is easy without having to resort to theories about
the underlying causes (eg imperialism).
Only very recently I came across a die-hard Republican-supporting
American (not a friend of mine!). He is anti-SH and believes in
direct military intervention, assassination, bombing etc and thought
that sanctions were a good thing. On being exposed to the facts
about sanctions he fairly soon came round to the view that non-
military sanctions should be lifted urgently. Even the control of oil
sales income he then disagreed with when we pointed out that this
produced a command economy - a communist model with no room
for capitalism!
>The only question is do these meetings need to run
> in parallel to the current National Co-rdination Meetings (NCM)
In parallel - reports from anti-war meetings can be shared with NCM
members.
> In essence, we cannot frame any events or discuss anything whilst
> maintaining a blanket ban on political discussion within the movement.
I can understand your frustration but I would support keeping the
ban. I wouldn't even allow time-limited sessions for political
discussion. The danger is that some people would become
alienated. Time would be wasted on 'framing' the events. You gave
two views of 1284. There are others possible. Only recently I had
the whole scenario explained to me just in the context of Israel.
I suppose a possible compromise would be to have one small
session which split into two separate groups - those wanting the
political discussion and those not.
A paraphrased casual discussion with a former UK air force officer:
me: these bombings are useless. They cost money and achieve
nothing. Even worse, SH can trigger them when he wants.
him: we're not seen to initiate them and they serve to keep the
media and the public's eyes off the ball (the genocidal sanctions)
Mark Parkinson
Cornwall
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I'm glad someone on this list wants to discuss these issues!
More pragmatically, the more people and organisations that are
involved and the narrower the focus (criminal, humanitarian,
genocide, sanctions) the better chance we have of making
progress against sanctions (and such progress would help
undermine the imperialists).
I can understand what you mean but I'm not sure that this point is made in
the right way.
Surely, the broader the issue the more chance there is of onvolving more groups
and
individuals. At the moment, many groups are not attending because they see
a focus on
sanctions that ignores bombing as unprincipled and illogical.
In terms of civilian casualties sanctions far outweigh the illegal
bombings.
This seems to be the argument of a small Cambridge group around Colin Rowat
but it
seems hard to sustain. Operation Desert storm destroyed manufacturing industries,
water
sanitation, oil production, electricity facilities, hospitals, schools, roads,
bridges, fertiliser
plants etc. poisoning the environment with uranium dust for untold generations.
It in this
context of near apocalyptic destruction and subsequent leverage over Iraq that
sanctions
have their deadly effect. However, you may say that bombing's in the past.
Yet even
now without constant military monitoring, naval and air blockade the sanctions
against
Iraq would be far more permeable. Look at Cuba- it has been im[poversihed but
thousands aren't dying- because constant air missions and bombing doesn't take
place
because Cuba can defend its air space: currently, Iraq cannot.
I would dearly love to get HRW and Amnesty actively fighting these
sanctions. Any sniff of anti-war or anti-imperialism and they would
disapppear.
If we could get them involved in that would be good. If the only method of
involvement
was to have an exclusively humanitarian panel then so be it (I suspect you may
be right
with these groups- though even Amnesty doesn't fear condemning acts of war particulary
when they happen in other countries, though they've also condemned asylum and
detention here, surely a 'political' matter). However, our proposal is to have
a split
agenda- if they or we needed to withdraw then fine. Human Relief Foundation
(HRF), a
charity of high prestige and publicity among Britain's 1.5 million Muslim population,
cannot take on political positions but have already informed me that they would
have no
problem whatsoever with participating in a session as I have outlined- withdrawing
form
the more political discussions- and participating actively in other sessions.
They are a key
organisation who regularly take aid into Iraq, have a very high public profile
in certain
areas, and have no problem with these proposals.
It is quite possible to get middle of the road, establishment and
even right wingers to fight against sanctions. They need to be told
about the effects of sanctions and have the US/UK arguments
answered which is easy without having to resort to theories about
the underlying causes (eg imperialism).
Only very recently I came across a die-hard Republican-supporting
American (not a friend of mine!). He is anti-SH and believes in
direct military intervention, assassination, bombing etc and thought
that sanctions were a good thing. On being exposed to the facts
about sanctions he fairly soon came round to the view that non-
military sanctions should be lifted urgently
I think we should actively encourage all sorts of people to get involved-
peace groups,
Islamic groups, church groups, political groups, antiracists etc. We should
use the simple
arguments about the thousands dying, the millions suffering etc. yes. I don't
understand
your objection to the term Imperialist though- it's a bit like saying we can
support the
Indian protest movements around Gandhi etc but we mustn't use the term Empire
or
Imperialist. However, if you wish to avoid the term, fine. The point is that
at the moment
we risk certain groups feeling excluded from participating fully in NCMs if
they have a
certain analysis: most Iraqis in this country, also mainly anti-SH though for
far more
credible reasons than the person you refer to, often use Imperialism as a term
(and living
reality)- they should not be excluded.
As for the extremely rare person who supports bombing but not sanctions I have
no fear
of alienating them; we don't need them- in fact, we should not make common cause
with
them otherwise we could end up appearing to support war against Iraq and, for
that
matter, alienate far more people.
A paraphrased casual discussion with a former UK air force officer:
me: these bombings are useless. They cost money and achieve
nothing. Even worse, SH can trigger them when he wants.
him: we're not seen to initiate them and they serve to keep the
media and the public's eyes off the ball (the genocidal sanctions)
A paraphrased casual discussion with a former UK air force officer:
me: these bombings are useless. They cost money and achieve
nothing. Even worse, SH can trigger them when he wants.
him: we're not seen to initiate them and they serve to keep the
media and the public's eyes off the ball (the genocidal sanctions)
Interesting but implausible surely? The anti-sanctions movement is small compared
to
nearly a million people in anti-Desert Storm demo in 1990/91. Why? Well, there
may be
other reasons but the lack of media attention now must count for a lot. Actually,
in my
expereince it's easier to get people mobilised and active about bombing than
sanctions-
apart from they cannot be seperated. If the officer is right why don't we see
constant TV
coverage of the bombing and how Iraq's bringing it on itself etc. Because they
do not
want people to know about the bombing- many people don't as long as we campaign
against sanctions only we continue to mislead as people will think the bombing
is over
(otherwise that lot would be shouting about that, too!)
Anyway, apart from the right-wing Republican, have you or anyone ever met a
member
of the public who opposes sanctions whilst supporting bombing- we never have
(yet)
though occassionally the other way round, people who oppose bombing but think
sanctions should stay in place because of Saddam, or they're put in by the UN
or
whatever.
I suppose a possible compromise would be to have one small
session which split into two separate groups - those wanting the
political discussion and those not.
This could well be a possible compromise and various groups would support this-
though
actually the main session could be in common and then a sub-group (the majority
we
predict but time will see) could issue a joint statement and call an action
on an anti-war
basis.
Cheers
Jason,
Manchester.
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